Welcome to Block¤Nebula, this website is about advocating the potential of cryptocurrencies and crypto-utilities. It will be continually updated, and edits will occur as the crypto world is very quickly evolving. I am doing my best to be a decentralized lobbyist for a fantastic future full of crypto's being used to benefit everyone, and can use all the support I can get. I hope you enjoy all the links in the menus above about various topics, and will also adopt support of cryptos.

Everyone likes to assume cryptos are the new laundering/drug/terrorist utility of the 21st century. But to anyone acquainted it's pretty clear that it's considerably harder to use them in general for such things. They promote transparency. It's not like carrying around a briefcase full of untraceable bills. Even when you can keep your situation private - rightly so - conversions in and out of fiat are not really conducive to covert activity since most are tied to Bitcoin (trackable) or require a healthy registration with law abiding institutions.

And the UK reports... cryptos are not being used for illegal activity that much. Unlike fiat since money came into existence.

Japan has always been isolated, but they still have deer. Until 1905 they had wolf as well, but without predators the whole island is looking at massive erosion problems. Part of the issue is cultural, how & what they consume as food; demanding quality, namely. With the use of a blockchain they can keep track of sources and have some faith in sourcing of wild game meat.

It's not clear exactly how it will be used. Perhaps tied to GPS, for one, when a token for a deer is minted? Then down the chain as it is slaughtered the token will be split.

On the 28th I met up with Mr. McCoy in the old Davenport, downtown Spokane. As my luck would have it not only did I get to enjoy the old & ornate hotel, there were some women about, dressed like they were straight out of Downton Abbey. So long as I only looked at them I was transported to a long passed yesteryear.

Unfortunately Mr. Baumgartner is too busy to make it to many meetings, and was out of the country. But his assistant Mr. McCoy is readily available to meet up & willing to lend an ear.

This meeting turned out as mostly some basic education about the crypto world. Due to McCoy's past in dealing with infrastructure for internet & business abroad, he caught on very quickly. He has a lot of knowledge of history that parallels today.

Our time was fairly short, but what I'm looking forward to the most is potentially getting some perspective from a business man Mr. McCoy knows - whom was a US citizen that became a Chinese citizen. Why? Because the perspective of the US vs Asia may play an instrumental choice in adoption differences of cryptos. Asia is clamoring all over Ripple, and the US has a choice to make. In the interest of the people we should hope to see government encouraging public crypto use, while Asia burdens themselves with consortium cryptos & non-currency blockchain tech.

Look forward to more. Plz show your support, travel is paramount to approaching a wider audience.

Here's a fantastic use for a crypto, using it as a franchise system. The basics are that it is viable for everyone involved to benefit from "options" in the form of tokens, that are used as incentives for a variety of things. For example if you invite other orders, then as a customer you can get a small piece of a token. Drivers who perform well can get pieces as well. As the franchise grows, the tokens become much more valuable. Here's the white paper.

I first met Matt Shea at a local meeting that happens in the morning on Friday, where different speakers come to talk about political matters (mostly). That day it was he and I. At the time I was slightly surprised that people were not asking him more questions, but it appeared they knew his positions well. Then I got up to talk about cryptos. Well, around an hour later than the time allotted for me speaking, I got to chat with Matt Shea, briefly, and we decided to meet up later.

On the 11th I went to his office. We talked about numerous things, including self driving cars - Matt is big on pointing out they'll be here soon in varying capabilities. I won't bore you with a verbatim account, but will focus in on a few things.

First, I brought up WA state Senate BIll 5031. Matt knew it immediately, and informed me he voted against it for the same clear reasons anyone that believes in cryptos would. And he also informed me that it was almost unanimously passed. Knowing that a bill passed, which tries to pretend cryptos are not, well, cryptos, is somewhat disturbing. If you read the law it sounds "reasonable" if you have no idea how cryptos work. The law puts in place requirements that a traditional double-spending-capable entity - that operates on IOU's - would need; by requiring reserves. Obviously that cannot work for an entity that merely swaps cryptos like some of Shapeshift's services that have discontinued in WA. The other thing that is the worst of its attributes is that it requires 3rd party audits, no matter whether it plays custodian or not, which means they have to keep a record of who is using it and what they've done. Think worse than Equifax problems because it is not just a record of whom, but also the amounts of cryptos (wealth).

It seems slightly hard to believe that so many who voted for the 5031 truly mean to be killing cryptos (business) in their state. Considering the bill was even re-edited it would show that leaving in redundant requirements probably means that the approval stems more out of a lack on education on cryptos, than anything else. Which is where another informative bit came up, Matt Shea told me that he has introduced bills before, not because he was expecting them to pass, but because it creates a set of events that educate the elected officials.

Maybe it is time to start drafting an assortment of bills related to cryptos? Once introduced it will get read, and because no elected official has all the time in the world to understand everything, they'll ask people to come and speak on behalf of the subject. (Me? I would!)

Prior to the meeting Matt had told me about something called the Sound Money Committee. I lent him my email so that he could have someone from it send me some information. In the past on two occasions Matt Shea has introduced bills to bring functional tender ability to gold & silver - which is actually constitutionally correct. While reading information from the Sound Money Committee it became clear that the interests with the use of gold & silver align with cryptos: the ability for the average person to diversify wealth through means of actual ownership.

It's no secret that many Bitcoiners are interested in independence from the FED or whomever. It's also easy to dismiss them because it looks like they just want full abandonment. Whether or not that will ever happen isn't necessarily what the focus should be on. The clear desire is that people want to be able to situate themselves with wealth that isn't founded on the fragility of a non-backed asset that is tied to only a local government. For most people it appear nearly impossible since they are not accredited traders that can buy stuff all over the globe, in many markets, and afford the associated costs. They need simple answers. Clearly cryptos have become one of them. Is there a reason we can't have legal currency that is tax exempt from being treated as a commodity, with cryptos, gold, and silver?

As an example of how to use gold & silver: If there are depositories where you can buy both, and use a card like Visa as if it were a debit card in order to make purchases with that asset. You get the added protection of a safe haven, with the ease of spending the asset that is fluid just about anywhere. Cryptos are the same except the depository is a decentralized ledger in the digital world.

A question comes up, if gold & silver should be not taxed as commodities, if they are a legal currency, why would cryptos be? The subject of tax surprised me, when Matt Shea did not see the point of tax on cryptos. For awhile now I've been saying make it simple, just pay income tax on them; because capital gain tax is more or less a way to invite the devil into your home (or exchange), not because I believe they should be taxed. But now I cannot recommend that after Matt asked a question I haven't seen yet in reference to the crypto world, what would the tax pay for?

The only particular moment that services involving cryptos warrant any tax is upon conversion to fiat with MSBs& regulations for them. I'd like to find the figures on taxes that pay for that oversight because it's not unusual for different government expenditures to be amply paid. As an example Matt Shea informed me the property tax in WA state has become nearly redundant; and a little improvement in efficiency within the state's tax use would make it unnecessary. So back to cryptos, why should there be taxes on them, and the BIG question, what does the tax pay for?

Now, something I've speculated about the cryptos world, if people believe and act as though something is true, then it is likely to become the law/regulation. According to Matt Shea that is often seen, where regular participation becomes a standard to which a law is drafted. That is a good thing since cryptos are still new and early in every aspect. So long as people continue using them in such ways that make them of value, then we can expect that to become a norm instead of the field tests of cramming them into existing inapplicable laws with a punitive outlook for them.

Clearly education will be important. Do what you can, don't send up white flags, don't let the FUD burn you. I'll be continuing to speak with more elected officials, working on ideas for bills (for example that would also repeal 5031), and letting them know your interests. Matt Shea was refreshingly in support, but I may not always be so lucky with whom I meet. Please help me spread my range of influence for your interests, check out my support page.

When you create a cryptocurrency, and hold onto massive portions of if for development... You hold the power to inflate or deflate th currency. You can make back door deals that are not public; where banks and such can purchase at a discount instead of the market price. And you can get sued because you're a vulnerable centralized entity.

Where are the validator & server votes for slinging around private deals for purchasing a currency?

There is no doubt that cryptos are in a very early stage. It's this kind approach that everyone should wish for so we can accelerate development & benefits. They still have a few steps to go towards enlightenment, but one step forward is a use case for all.

As the article states, it has been long standing that central banks would love to go with digital money. It can be used for very good accountability, tracking, transparency, etc.

There is just one problem, if it's a private cryptocurrency then they can change your "wallet" account at will. There is nothing to stop them from free reign of doing anything their imaginations can come up with. But maybe the true problem is people that don't understand cryptos, at all, think they will be reducing problems since decentralized cryptos they read about all the time, would.

If the banks believe the public enthusiasm for cryptos will grant them adoption, for their private blockchain, they are sadly mistake. It appears they are even addressing issues of a private blockchain, like double spending. It's highly ironic considering double spending is the first and easiest thing to eliminate on any publicly decentralized cryptocurrency - it's basically the essence of what a cryptocurrency is, never double spendable.

Bitcoin is not anonymous. While trying to track bitcoins down isn't easy it is possible. Cryptos keep things honest, and policing agencies are taking advantage of that. We should expect to see more uses where cyptos free up the costs of many public and government activities.

While it isn't on a decentralized network yet, it's clear some of the most major players in the food world for the USA are looking into blockchains for tracking.

The data should be public. It can be studied and evaluated. The bad products can literally be pulled off of the shelves and the good ones that appear identical from the same and other manufacturers can be left on them.

We should all hope to see this type of tracking leading to an allowance of the growing organic food industry to conduct themselves differently than the major industrialized food vendors; we could stop paying taxes on useless oversight.

While there are questions about security of cryptos by custodians, this still reads as comedy so good you can't make it up... Let's quantify this... how many times has the actual Bitcoin network been hacked? 0. How many times has the US Government, stock exchanges, banks, etc, been hacked? You and everyone you have ever met don't have enough fingers to count that high.

If you've read my article on taxes, or realized what cryptos are, you clearly understand that they're out of the purview of the state and it's senseless to allow the IRS to impose taxes on an emerging technology because it'll severely hurt the USA; if not toss it off the totem pole of power.

But what about the people evading taxes from fiat, with cryptocurrencies? In this sense I actually believe the IRS is 100% justified to try and track people doing just that. How that will happen is a bit of a mystery. But as of now they are one step closer to being able to catch tax dodgers. I applaud them catching tax evaders, but denounce anything beyond that since it's basically unpatriotic. They might as well file registration with the communist party if they are going to chase people that haven't evaded taxes in fiat but also own Bitcoin.

A new ICO out right now is looking at tokenizing the shipping industry. I am not advocating anyone buy in the token sale, but it's a case for a model of how a crypto-utility can be used.

Given that the shipping industry stops in many places, and has a lot of vested interest, it seems plausible from the outside perspective that there could be a lot of mistrust and funny business. A token adds transparency for the booker and bookie. Due to the nature of trading with cryptos it also gives real time value which can be reflective of bookings, possibly giving way to more appropriate projections; which would help protect everyone involved.

Bank of America has applied for many patents on blockchain/cryptos. If you've dived in enough to know a basic idea of how cryptos run, you can understand how patents can only be applicable as far as jurisdiction of one countries law, which falls vastly short of any crypto network. It makes no sense for any crypto to limit itself by only being in the patent purview of the USA, and pay for use (to BOA).

Cryptos by principles are cheaper & more secure because they are decentralized, immutable, and peer regulated down to the code that is run on all the miners and nodes. Their strength is in the opposite of a single entity being in control, a form of centralization. At best maybe BOA will seek to sue someone and tie them up in court, which is laughable because even if Satoshi himself was facing BOA's army of lawyers, Bitcoin itself wouldn't even notice.

It's a hot topic about the risk in ICO's. People are falsely in belief regulations protect them with regular securities, and so there has been a backlash against ICO's in general. It's clear most people don't fully understand ICO's, and even less so how paramount autonomy of asset use is to new generations. ICO's have the potential to be entirely peer regulated without looking towards regulation from a centralized source - being antithetical to the crypto world. Take a look a small look into the dark path into the past that some are working toward.

Basically the gist of the article is that institutions that desire the advantages of traditional securities are looking for a path in that allows them to easily, and legally take advantage of the markets. While just a step forward into the legality is appealing just in the fact that it allows participation, it may also represent the dirty world of traditional investments where vested parties can pump & dump, short, and a variety of other things to wreak absolute havoc. Don't be surprised if a registered ICO's gets a loan from a parent company running it, pumps the market, dumps it, and claims insurance on the inability for it to pay the loan despite paying off the principle; due to gross interest. That's what the registered security world is like, and it is 'legal'. Use your imagination how much anyone working for the parent company, under the ICO, walks away with short of legal accusations and threats. It's just [centralized] business.

An article over at VentureBeat talks about improvements dealing with 3rd world problems with blockchains; and touches based on some other things. However someone should inform Michael J. Casey that the resources required for blockchains, that are not mining, are a benefit when compared to competing old infrastructure required to do the "same job*".